Читать книгу Wedding Captives - Cassie Miles, Cassie Miles - Страница 13

The seat removed and reinstalled, Spence backed away and Jordan got out, sliding shut the door behind him as another vehicle chugged into the parking area and yet another one approached on the access road.

A tall, angular man unfolded from behind the steering wheel of a conservative black station wagon. His unsmiling face marked with a prominent, hawkish nose reminded Spence of the early Puritans. This impression was confirmed by the clerical collar encircling the man’s skinny neck.

As Spence and Jordan approached, he introduced himself. “Reverend Joshua Handy. Which of you is Gregory Rosemont?”

“Neither.” Spence made the introductions.

The reverend appeared impatient. “Jenny told me I’d have a chance to talk with Gregory before the ceremony.”

“You’ve never met him?” Spence asked.

“No.” He looked down his long nose. “Where’s Jenny?”

“Not here,” Spence said. “Not even her car. I’m guessing she and Rosemont have some kind of chauffeur service up to the gondola. They’re probably both already up at the castle. Need any help with your luggage?”

Joshua Handy shook his head, and turned back to his hearse-like station wagon. “I’ll manage.”

Tempted to walk back up the frozen slope and insert himself into the chat Emily and Thea were having, Spence let himself be dragged along with Jordan as the other car pulled into a space near to their own. A tiny dynamo of a woman exited her car. She was overly bundled up for her drive in a puffy parka and a scarf around her throat. Spikes of gray hair poked around the edges of a colorful Norwegian ski cap.

Her wizened features reminded Spence of a troll. Luckily, her beaming mitigated the harshness. “Hello! I’m Doctor Mona Nance.”

Spence shook her over-large mitten. “Medical doctor?”

“Psychologist,” she said.

Jordan shook her mitten in turn and smirked. “Well, Doctor Mona, you might be real busy this weekend.”

BREAKING OFF her conversation with Emily, Thea went back inside the stone gondola house. She carefully kept her distance from Spence as the other guests arrived—Travis the hotshot, Dr. Mona Nance and a dour minister who looked as though he was more prepared for a funeral than a wedding. An unusual group! No one but she and Spence seemed to know each other. She glanced at her wristwatch. It was thirteen minutes past the time designated to depart from the gondola house for the ride to Castle in the Clouds. She thought the wedding party was beginning to show signs of restlessness.

Impatient, Travis repeatedly jabbed the buttons on a cell phone he plucked out of a pocket, trying to reach the castle. He finally snapped the thing closed. “Well, this is a total bummer. I’m not getting through. What’s the deal?”

Thea wondered if it was really possible Travis had never had that result in the mountains before.

The Reverend Joshua Handy, meanwhile, was eyeing the gondola machinery that made her nervous too. With long, skeletal fingers, he touched the cogs. “It might be best to take things into our own hands.”

A brilliant example of good old Yankee ingenuity? Thea shivered. “What do you mean?”

“Perhaps we’re expected to start this thing ourselves.”

“I think not.” She was nervous enough about riding in the gondola without adding reckless incompetence to the mix.

“We should wait,” Dr. Mona Nance counseled. “I’m sure we’ll receive instructions.”

“Don’t need a lesson book,” Travis said. “You just yank the lever. Like turning on a light bulb. You get it, Doctor Shrink?”

The wizened little psychologist stepped in front of him. Her small face turned up. Her head tilted back. “Because of my stature, I find that term particularly offensive.”

“Shrink?”

“Precisely.”

The tone of her voice held such authority that even an insensitive oaf like Travis was cowed. “Sorry, ma’am.”

Backing off, he and the reverend discussed the possibility of starting the gondola, and Thea’s gaze slipped toward Spence. Long legs stretched out in front of him, he sat on one of the stone benches beside his two friends, Emily and Jordan.

A nice couple, Thea thought, who seemed utterly loyal to Spence. Emily just glowed talking about him, expounding for Thea on what a wonderful doctor he was, brilliant, thoughtful, reverent, not to mention an expert in search-and-rescue who had saved countless lives. Thea thought the lives he had saved probably could be counted, but she wasn’t surprised. She’d never doubted Spence’s competence.

Still, she found it somewhat hard to believe that he’d reined in his world-conquering ambitions and settled for working in a small town. Was it possible that he had changed? That he’d become even a little less arrogant and self-involved?

She tried, on the sly, to assess the differences wrought in five years. His features had become more chiseled with strong jawline and high cheekbones. Fine lines crisscrossed his forehead and radiated from the corners of his breathtaking blue eyes. She wished she could see below the surface, to know if the changes in Spence ran more than skin deep.

Dr. Mona approached and perched on the bench beside Thea. The psychologist’s tiny little legs were so short that her feet didn’t touch the stone floor. “How do you know Jenny?” she asked pleasantly.

“We work together at the middle school. I teach English and American History.”

“Sixth, seventh and eighth graders,” Dr. Mona said. “A difficult age. I’m always curious. How do you handle classroom discipline with that age group?”

“Like a lion tamer. With a whip and a chair,” Thea joked. She felt Spence’s attention on her. “On good days, I enjoy the challenge.”

“And on bad days?”

“It’s a struggle,” she admitted. “What about you, Doctor? Are you a friend of Jenny’s family?”

“Actually, Jenny is my client,” Dr. Mona said. “I know her quite well.”

Though Thea hadn’t known her friend was in therapy, it wasn’t exactly a revelation. Teaching in an inner-city middle school made for a fairly high-stress occupation, especially after Columbine. It had been in the press recently that teachers in the Denver area suffered significantly more from stress than the already high levels documented nationwide.

Very likely, Thea thought, Jenny had discussed her fiancé with her therapist as well. Dr. Mona’s professional opinion would be very interesting. “What do you make of Gregory Rosemont?”

“Mysterious, isn’t he?” Doctor Mona commented noncommittally.

“Very. What concerns me, though,” Thea admitted, “is that Jenny thinks he’ll come out of his shell after they’re married. You know, become more sociable.” Thea paused. “Do you think that’s possible?”

“I believe people can change or modify their behavior.” Her cheeks rounded as she grinned. “Otherwise, my work is a sham.”

Thea glanced toward Spence. “What does it take to change?”

“Most of all,” Dr. Mona said, “a willingness.” She patted Thea’s knee, and resorted to every therapist’s escape hatch. “What do you think, dear?”

Straying from Jenny’s issues with Gregory Rosemont, Thea thought that even if Spence had changed, she wasn’t sure she could forgive him. Five years ago, he had shredded her self-esteem and handed it back to her like so much confetti on a silver platter.

“Somebody’s coming,” Travis announced as he flung open the door of the gondola house and charged into the snow.

The others straggled outside behind him. During the few minutes they’d been in the gondola house, the storm clouds had thickened. A bitter chill shimmered in the air.

A stocky, middle-aged man huffed and puffed his way up the path toward the gondola house.

“Hey, dude,” Travis bellowed, “you’re late if you’re here to take us up to the castle.”

The man paused, red-faced from his exertions. Before he spoke, he planted both feet and corrected his posture. His shoulders squared beneath his black parka. He assumed an attitude of dignity. “Please accept my apologies for the delay.”

The ruddy man carefully removed his knit cap and smoothed the thinning strands of his black hair. “I am the Rosemont butler. My name is Lawrence. May I suggest that before we proceed with further introductions, we step inside?”

Back inside the gondola house, Thea found herself standing beside Spence. If she made a point of moving away, he might think she feared contact. Did she? Was she afraid of him? Quickly, she polled her emotions. First and foremost, she felt antsy. Nervous to be around him. Angry that he looked so fine. More angry that the simmering rage over what he’d done to her five years ago, rage she’d been certain would not cool no matter what, seemed to have cooled in spite of her.

No matter, she assured herself, distracted by Travis’s whining, she would never forgive Spence, even if…or when the old rage turned stone-cold.

“May I have your attention,” Lawrence said. He pulled out a cell phone. “Anyone else got one of these?”

Everyone nodded, even wizened little Doctor Mona.

“How about computers? Any palm-tops? Laptops?”

The Reverend Joshua Handy bleated. “Is there a point to all this? I need my computer—”

“Sorry,” Lawrence interrupted, “but before we make the ascent to Castle in the Clouds, Mr. Rosemont has requested that all computers, pagers, cell phones and other electronic devices be left behind.”

“Why?” Spence demanded.

“The heating and electrical systems in the castle are run by highly sophisticated electronics which might be severely disrupted by interference.” He shrugged as if to make light of the need to divest. “You’ll find there is no cellular service available in any case.”

“No way,” Travis protested, though he’d already proved what Lawrence said was true, trying to dial up the castle. “I need to be in contact with my people.”

Lawrence replied, “There are, of course, computers and telephones in the castle which will be available for your use.”

“I don’t like it,” Travis said.

“Terribly sorry, but I must insist.” Lawrence had caught his breath. He strutted toward the corner of the room and stood beside the large metal safe. “I’m certain you will all be pleasantly enough occupied for the weekend and by the wedding that you won’t even miss your own devices. Please do give me all electronic items, and I will secure them here for you to retrieve when you leave the castle.”

Grumbling, the wedding guests divested themselves of pocket planners and cell phones. The reverend even unzipped his suitcase and gave up the laptop he had brought along.

Thea stepped back beside Emily and Jordan. “Seems weird,” she said.

Emily looked to her new husband, “You’re the computer genius. What do you think?”

“I doubt a cell phone could mess up Rosemont’s electronics, but you never know.”

“What about the computer thing?” Thea asked.

“Paranoia,” Jordan said. “A guy like Rosemont might think one of you is a spy, planning to download his programs.”

A spy? Paranoia? Seeds of foreboding took root in Thea’s fertile imagination. She’d known that Rosemont was eccentric, but locking up the cell phones seemed obsessive. “What happens if the phones in the house break down?”

“Unlikely.” Dr. Mona was beside her once again. “Rosemont’s attention to detail seems to border on the compulsive. He’ll have back-up systems for his backups.”

The tiny psychologist seemed almost pleased by this turn of events. Thea had the idea that Dr. Mona viewed this wedding as a research project on aberrant neuroses. Speaking of which…

Thea glanced toward the fiberglass gondola car. The moment of departure was rapidly approaching, and she wasn’t looking forward to traveling, suspended by a thin steel cable above a thousand-foot plummet into the forbidding, nearly arctic landscape. Surely, that was an exaggeration. The chasm wasn’t a thousand feet. Nor was the cable excessively slender. Did it matter? If they fell, the crash would certainly be fatal.

“Nervous?” Emily asked.

“I don’t like heights.” With a glance at Dr. Mona, Thea hurriedly added, “I’m not acrophobic.” But even though she could ride the chair lift to go skiing, as she carefully explained to Dr. Mona, Thea knew she was not telling the truth. “It makes me a little tense.”

Spence joined them. “It’s okay, Thea.”

“What’s that supposed to mean?” She hadn’t meant to snap, but she didn’t want to appear weak in front of him. “I’m not scared.”

“You’ll be fine.”

“I know.” To prove her courage, she grabbed her suitcase and the garment bag and went to stand, first in line, to board the gondola car.

As soon as the soles of her boots touched the skid-proof flooring, her knees turned to rubber. There were windows all around the ten-person car, which seemed much like a minibus, except that it would be suspended in mid-air.

“Hurry up,” Travis called out.

Concentrating with all her might, Thea stumbled to one of the bench seats and collapsed. The molded plastic seat was so slick that she might have slid onto the floor if her muscles hadn’t suddenly tensed. She shuddered into a full-body spasm. The ratcheting noise of the machinery deafened her. Was this thing safe? When was the last inspection?

Thea clutched the garment bag against her body. She was probably wrinkling the frothy bridesmaid dress, but she didn’t care. Through blurred vision, she sensed Spence’s approach. If he made a snotty comment, she’d kill him.

He sat beside her. “Can I hold the garment bag for you?”

“No.” If they fell, she could use the dress as a parachute.

“Is everyone ready?” Lawrence asked.

Her lips pinched together, fighting the urge to scream. What if they fell? Whether it was a thousand feet or five hundred or five thousand, what did it matter? These might be the last people she ever saw in her whole life. The thunder of her heartbeat would be the last sound she ever—

They swooped away from the stone house, suspended from a thread and climbing. Don’t look down!

But she didn’t even have to look down. An awful sensation, of the earth dropping away, her stomach falling, her heart racing, rushed over her. Frantically groping, Thea clutched Spence’s hand.

And before she knew what she was doing, her face was buried against his shoulder. This was wrong, all wrong. And yet, in her heart, she knew if Spence hadn’t been beside her, she’d have found herself in the throes of a full-blown panic attack.

In her heart, she wondered what Spence had to do with it.

JORDAN AND EMILY stood beside the stone house, waving at the gondola as it climbed slowly across the precipitous chasm toward the castle which was entirely hidden by dark January clouds. Jordan pulled Emily closer, protecting her from a chill that wasn’t entirely due to the weather.

“There’s something about this wedding,” he said, “that makes me uneasy.”

“Leaving the cell phones behind seemed odd. And why was the butler late?” She shrugged. “Maybe we’re the ones who are paranoid, imagining a threat at every turn.”

After the fugitive hunt that had brought them together, Jordan wouldn’t be surprised if he and Emily were overly sensitive to danger. Especially when Spence was involved. If it hadn’t been for the good doctor’s help, Jordan would probably be in jail on death row. “Spence will be okay.”

She frowned. “I’m sure you’re right. I hope things work out for him and Thea. I liked her.”

“Me, too.” Jordan turned away from the gondola. “Let’s go.”

She dug the toe of her boot into the snow, scanning the dark, threatening skies. “You’re right. We should try to beat the storm back to Cascadia.”

He nodded. Jordan hated the snow, but he loved sitting in front of a roaring fire with his beautiful new wife.

Emily tracked the progress of the gondola car moving through space toward the Castle in the Clouds. “Did you notice how scared Thea was to get on that thing?”

Jordan shrugged. “Some people are. What’s really worrying you? If there’s a problem, Spence will call.”

“And then what? Take a look at that place. It’s a search-and-rescue nightmare. Jagged cliffs on every side. The only way out in an emergency would be helicopter rescue.”

“Hold on,” he said, teasing her gently. “Earlier, you said the castle reminded you of princesses and jousts.”

Emily shivered hard in the blistering cold. “That was before I remembered that dragons also live in castles.”

THE SLOWLY ASCENDING gondola car shuddered in the swirling mountain winds, but Spence was unconcerned about the surrounding glacial landscape. The scope of his universe had shrunk to a bell jar. Starting with the moment Thea’s forehead touched his shoulder, his consciousness focused entirely upon her. He actually enjoyed the feel of her slender fingers clutching his hand in a white-knuckled death grip of terror. Her fear of heights—something he had never suspected in her—had worked to his advantage.

Spence held himself very still, not wanting to disturb this moment. He knew better than to whisper reassurances that she might take as condescension. Nor did he reach across her body to fully embrace her. His job was simply to be there for her, solid as a rock, trustworthy. Sooner or later, she’d wake up and realize that he was basically a good guy.

Maybe it would be sooner. After all, she’d instinctively turned to him when she was scared, which might mean that on a visceral, almost cellular level, she still trusted him. Or it might mean nothing more than that she would’ve grabbed anybody sitting beside her in the gondola car. Spence didn’t care. He was grateful for this hint of their former intimacy. Careful not to disturb her, he inhaled the clean fragrance of her soft chestnut-brown hair. Through the layers of their parkas and turtlenecks, he felt the subtle outline of her slender body.

In a strangled whisper, she asked, “How much farther?”

“Ten minutes.”

He wanted to tell her it wasn’t so bad, but he was feeling a little queasy himself. Like a giant yo-yo, deprived of gravity’s solace, the gondola bounced in space, hundreds of feet above towering ice splinters. In this hostile environment, the tall conifers marched up the mountainside like a snow-encrusted army guarding the Castle in the Clouds.

At the front of the gondola, Lawrence the butler stood before a simple control panel. The reverend and Dr. Mona were seated, staring and mesmerized by the spectacular view. Only Travis was in motion, ducking down to peer from the windows on one side, then the other.

“Hey, Larry,” Travis said, “how did this castle get built, anyway?”

“I prefer to be called Lawrence,” the butler said.

“Okay, Lawrence,” Travis drawled. “How’d they build this place?”

“I assume you are referring to the apparent impossibility of transporting building materials to such an extremely isolated location.”

“Well, yeah,” Travis muttered as if it were the most obvious thing in the world.

With a shrug of his round shoulders, Lawrence explained, “The opposite wall of this peak was a marble quarry. In the late 1800s, some of the finest marble in the world was quarried here, then cut and polished by artisans who came from Italy. A narrow-gauge railroad transported the stones which were used in monuments throughout North America.”

“So?” Travis said. “Are you saying that the rear approach to the castle isn’t so steep?”

“Quite the contrary.” Lawrence continued, “In seeking the most excellent veins of marble, the walls were literally shaved back into steep cliffs.”

“Interesting,” Dr. Mona said. “The castle appears to be the domain of someone seeking total isolation, but that wasn’t the case.”

“Not at all,” Lawrence said. “Though the first owner was known to be a cutthroat entrepreneur, he built this castle to please his wife, a proper Bostonian lady who insisted that the quarry be shut down on Sunday, the day of rest.”

The reverend murmured his approval.

Lawrence added, “There’s a chapel in the castle.”

Spence felt Thea’s grip on his hand begin to relax as she listened to the history of the Castle in the Clouds. Though he was glad her fear had begun to abate, he hoped she wouldn’t pull away from him. He wanted the connection with her, no matter how tenuous.

“And yet,” Lawrence said, “no one would mistake the castle for a cathedral. The bridal suite—which you can see from here—at the top of the north tower where the light is lit, features some rather decadent statuary.”

The stern-faced reverend inhaled a disapproving sniff through his long red nose. “The castle’s isolation is an appropriate homily.” As if pronouncing the locale an indictment against an ill-fated wedding and a groom he had yet to meet, Joshua Hardy intoned, “It was greed that caused them to chisel away at the wall of the mountain, leaving themselves stranded and alone.”